it necessary to handle them with the 

 ship's cargo winches. Therefore, only 

 two carcasses could be butchered at 

 any one time. Skinning was not diffi- 

 cult once the method was developed and 

 the crew had become experienced. 

 Trimming the meat from the car- 

 casses, particularly the shoulders, re- 

 quired more time than any other phase 

 of the operation. 



Any future attempt at harvesting 

 sea lions should make use of special- 

 ized equipment to reduce the amount 

 of labor required to process the car- 

 casses. Some method of handling more 

 than two carcasses at once would be 

 needed. This could be done by using 

 an overhead conveyor from which a 

 number of carcasses could be sus- 

 pended. It would be difficult to elimi- 

 nate hand trimming to remove the 

 meat from the carcasses and shoulders, 

 but the use of time-saving devices 

 such as conveyors would allow more 

 time for trimming. 



The method used to cool meat 

 aboard the Arctic Maid would not be 

 satisfactory for a larger operation. 

 First, spreading meat on the deck to 

 cool would not be practical because 

 space would be insufficient. Second, 

 to cool the meat by spreading it on the 

 ship's deck, it was necessary to leave 

 it on the deck over night. An alter- 

 nate method of chilling was tried in 

 which carcasses were allowed to hang 

 in the water from the gunwale of the 

 ship. This method was abandoned be- 

 cause the fat absorbed water and 

 formed a sticky jell which nnade trim- 

 ming difficult. 



Considerable time could be saved 

 if meat were cooled in a tank of cir- 

 culating sea water, or ground warm 

 and cooled in a hopper containing a 

 series of vertical refrigerated plates. 

 In either case, the meat could be 

 dropped on a conveyor belt by the 

 butchers and conveyed to a chilling 

 tank or to the grinder. 



The 15-hp. grinder used on the 

 Arctic Maid was satisfactory for grind- 

 ing meat only. It was capable of grind- 

 ing much larger volumes than the 2 to 



3 tons per day produced by the experi- 

 mental harvest. If bones were to be 

 included, a larger grinder would be 

 needed. 



The polyethylene bags used to 

 package the ground meat were satis- 

 factory for handling prior to freezing, 

 but they tore easily when the frozen 

 meat was handled. This permitted air 

 to circulate freely around the nneat 

 causing some dehydration and oxida- 

 tion. Double -wall paper bags with the 

 inner surface coated with polyethylene 

 were also tried. These bags tore easily 

 during handling prior to freezing, 

 especially if the outside of the bag 

 became wet. A sturdier bag would be 

 desirable in any future sea lion proc- 

 essing operation. There are a number 

 of bags available, such as a burlap- 

 polyethylene combination or a multi- 

 wall water-resistant paper bag con- 

 taining one asphalt paper layer. 



Staples which were used to close 

 most of the bags of meat were ineffi- 

 cient because of the time required to 

 hand staple each bag with five or six 

 staples. An unsuccessful attempt was 

 made to use a heat sealing machine to 

 seal the polyethylene bags. The ma- 

 chine usually overheated the thin poly- 

 ethylene, causing it to shrink con- 

 siderably in some areas , while in others 

 it did not seal at all. A machine for 

 stapling or sewing the bags would save 

 considerable time. With the water- 

 resistant multiwall or the burlap- 

 polyethylene bags, machine attached 

 wire ties could be used. 



The rate of freezing the 50-pound 

 bags of ground meat aboard the Arctic 

 Maid was slow. Approximately 3 days 

 were required to freeze them com- 

 pletely. Any future operation would 

 require a blast freezer or a plate 

 freezer for quick freezing the meat. 



The yield of meat per animal was 

 low because a considerable amount of 

 meat was left on the discarded car- 

 cass. Under the circumstances this 

 waste was unavoidable. The amount of 

 time required to trim all of the meat 

 from the backbone and between the 

 ribs was too great to justify doing so. 



12 



